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Thoughts on Pixar's CARS.

My main thought on CARS is that I love Paul Newman. I love anything vaguely related to Paul Newman. I like Newman’s Own salad dressings, and salsas, I’m leaning toward trying out the coffee, and other product line, heck if Paul Newman started hocking radioactive face cream, I’d so totally be there. I do not have a single moment of hesitation in saying that Paul Newman commands nothing but respect and admiration in me.

On the whole I have pretty similar sentiments with regards to Pixar’s films, as every movie has assuaged my doubts that quality movies can still be made. I may have mentioned a few times how, despite how the last few premises have left me cold, when I actually saw the movies, ehn it’s not even worth comment anymore. They’re Pixar, they rock. It’s what they do. So I was going to give CARS a shot no matter what, and it’s an excellent little movie with some great voice acting, amazing visuals and more than adequate storytelling. It’s not mind-blowingly phenominal, but quite enjoyable, and oh yeah, there’s the whole Paul Newman bit.

Key things worth mentioning- good tribute to car and automotive history- I like NASCAR to an extent so I have no problems there, but even more, I love the history of Nascar so the elements with Richard Petty and Rusty, the different stock car styles, etc were really solid. I also happen to love the nostalgia of Route 66 so the golden age sequence did in fact make me misty- but that’s the effect a lot of history has on me.

The ‘bugs’ were cute, a reminder that Pixar is always so sharp about boiling down the details, just so utterly refined with so much attention and care that continues to earn my respect at how the studio treats development. The main story isn’t really exceptional and Owen Wilson’s McQueen is a pretty pat hero, but they don’t over do it, and it ends up being a pretty seamless little fable with heart.

Worth seeing by all means, as is the case with every Pixar film. Enjoy the gorgeous tech, stellar cast and just go enjoy the lovely sound of Paul Newman’s voice. B+